APPAREL & PROMOTIONAL PRODUCTS
A reputable, well-resourced printing company like Carroll Printing can provide an array of apparel and promotional products. There are few limitations regarding what we can brand, as the following promo items are just a few examples:
T-shirts, sweatshirts, jackets and outerwear
Hats
Pens
Drinkware, like mugs
Bags
Calendars
Lanyards
Sporting goods
Watches
Automotive, kitchen and computer accessories
There are apparel and promotional products available for every event and every organization. An experienced professional printer will work with their clients to determine which of these promo items would make the biggest branding impact for a particular marketing campaign.
Apparel and Promotional Products for Marketing, Branding and Employee Recognition
Expert printing companies have access to an expanded range of print technologies and capabilities, such as laser engraving and dibond printing. These expanded capabilities enable printing services to promote a full range of apparel and promotional items that include:
Not sure what fits your event? Call 713-228-9331.
Branded Apparel and Wearables
Apparel: We can produce high quality logos and branding on all kinds of clothing, and a reputable printer will invest in durable materials that match modern fashion trends. Promotional clothing products include t-shirts, uniforms, jerseys, polos, jackets, sweatshirts, pants and various forms of outerwear.
Caps and hats: Promotional apparel that your printer can handle include a variety of fitted caps, safety wear, visors and beanies, available in styles to match any fashion sense.
Badges and lanyards: Perfect for corporate and marketing events, we can print on lanyards, name badges, badge holders and badge reels with your logo and company branding – in a variety of colors and styles.
Watches: As the classic executive gift or employee recognition award, watches are available in many styles and price points, and include men’s, women’s, unisex and sports watch designs, many of which are waterproof. Professional printers can also brand several types of smartwatches.
Desk and Office Items
Desk items: Promotional desk items are excellent options for reminding potential clients of your brand, which drives brand recognition and brand recall. There are many items to choose from, including binders, calculators, business card holders, paperweights, staplers, notepads and many more.
Pens: Companies can’t go wrong with pens, which can be produced in an endless array of pen styles and models. They include ballpoint, gel pens, retractable, roller ball, stick pens and twistables. Printers can also brand highlighters, pencils and even crayons.
Calendars: Corporate calendars are cost efficient marketing items or corporate gifts and also offer strong marketing opportunities when given to clients (or potential clients).
Clocks: Companies can turn clocks into memorable corporate gifts, and there are many desktop, alarm and wall clocks to choose from, in several aesthetic options.
Computer accessories: Computer accessories are among the most popular promotional giveaways at marketing events like trade shows. Proven promo items include USB drives, device chargers, USB hubs and mousepads.
Drinkware, Food and Kitchen
Mugs and drinkware: Mugs are a top promotional item and get a lot of use in offices and at home. In addition to coffee mugs, expert printers can brand glassware, barware, bottles, carafes, thermoses, tumblers and travel drinkware.
Food and beverage: Professional printers can brand and add your company logo to all kinds of gourmet and gift food and beverage options. They include cocoa, coffee, condiments, cookies, meats, nuts, popcorn, sauces, spices, tea and wine.
Candy and snacks: Expert printers are partnered with facilities that can produce branded snack or chocolate containers or even mold custom chocolate bars.
Kitchen and home: As expert printers can brand just about anything, they can also print on small kitchen appliances, containers, candles, frames, gardening tools and kitchen utensils or tools.
Bags, Travel and Key Tags
Bags: Still one of the most popular promotional items available, bags can be anything from a simple tote to a luxury piece of luggage. Other options include attaché cases, backpacks, briefcases, computer bags, duffel and sports bags, fanny packs, lunch bags and eco-friendly bags.
Travel items: Executives spend a lot of time on the road and in the air, so promotional travel items provide value to the people who receive them. And with a professional printing partner, you can brand luggage tags, toiletry kits, travel bags and travel kits – all TSA approved.
Key tags: Luggage tags, carabiners and keychains can all be produced out of branded plastic or metal materials and are low-cost giveaways that will receive frequent use.
Awards, Recognition and Executive Gifts
Awards and recognition: Professional printers can etch on glass and engrave on wood, acrylic or metal – perfect for creating corporate gifts or awards. These can take the form of plaques, desktop sculptures, medallions and a number of other classy, dignified options.
Executive gifts: For long-standing or exemplary employees and executives, professional printers can personalize a variety of kitchen appliances (like mixers or air fryers), fitness sets, cameras and different types of gift sets.
Event Giveaways
Fun and games: Branded games and toys are always well-received at marketing events. Promo items in this category include board games, balls, puzzles, yo-yos, kites, inflatables and models (airplanes and cars, for example).
Stress balls: Stress balls are inexpensive and easy to mass produce with any company logo, brand marks, messaging or iconography.
Eco friendly items: Some promotional printers are conscious of their environmental impact and offer durable or recyclable materials to print on, like cotton, metal or bamboo.
Healthcare: Healthcare items are popular for brand building at safety or health awareness events. First aid kits, hand sanitizer, lip balm, night lights, pedometers, pill boxes and cutters, sunglasses and sunscreen are common choices.
Trade, Sports and Outdoor
Sports and outdoor: Sports and outdoor items are frequently given out at marketing events and conventions. There are also plenty of sporting and outdoor products to choose from, including outerwear apparel, binoculars, blankets, camping chairs and supplies, compasses, fishing equipment, insulated bags, radios, towels, umbrellas and whistles.
Golf items: For the avid golfer out there – which includes many executives – golf gifts and branded golf items will leave a positive brand impact. Bag tags, ball markers, balls, caps, clubs, golf apparel, golf bags and towels are all good golf promo products.
Automotive: Automotive promotional items include keychains, flashlights, lanyards and small automotive tool kits.
Tools and hardware: Depending on the nature and location of your next marketing event, printing on tools or hardware may fit into your company’s branding efforts. Promo items in this category include BBQ sets, gardening tools, knives, lighters, thermometers and various measuring devices.
Please browse our online catalog or contact us at 713-228-9331 for assistance.
High Quality Promotional Apparel and Products Will Make a Strong Impact for Your Brand
Promotional marketing campaigns are generally successful, as everyone likes getting something for free. If your giveaways provide true value and standout printing, your brand will benefit from that positive response.
Another advantage of promotional printing is that it can be used with almost anything. That means your organization can be creative in how it leverages the power of quality promo printing. If you are interested in professional printing for apparel and promotional products, Carroll Printing can help effectively promote your brand.
Promotional Products and Custom Apparel for Greater Houston Businesses
Carroll Printing & Promotions has produced branded work in Houston since 1921. We are at 2907 Canal St., Houston, TX 77003, in the East End, which means a Greater Houston customer can bring a sample in, look at a proof, check a stitch-out or a press sheet, and leave knowing what the finished run will look like.
Most of the promotional work we handle falls into a few clear jobs:
- Company apparel for your team, staff and crews: polos, work shirts, caps and outerwear carrying an embroidered or screen printed mark. Branded uniforms do quiet, constant work for a company’s name, which is the argument made at more length in the business impact of branded apparel.
- Trade show and event giveaways: the pens, notebooks, tote bags, water bottles and drinkware that leave a booth in somebody’s hand. There is a real difference between a corporate gift and a giveaway, covered in corporate gifts versus tradeshow swag.
- Client and employee recognition: gift sets, awards and anniversary pieces, often paired with printed collateral so the whole package reads as one brand.
- Union and campaign merchandise: caps, shirts, buttons and lapel pins produced alongside union and political printing.
Pairing promotional items with print is usually where the value is. A trade show booth built from a banner, decals and signage, staffed by people in matching shirts, handing out something worth keeping, reads as one company rather than three separate purchases.
Embroidery or Screen Printing: Which One Your Job Wants
This is the question we are asked most often, and the answer is usually decided by the garment and the artwork rather than by preference.
- Embroidery stitches the design into the fabric. It holds up to repeated industrial washing, it reads as more formal, and it suits polos, caps, jackets, bags and anything a customer will see for years. It handles a compact logo well and a wide photographic image poorly.
- Screen printing pushes ink through a mesh onto the surface. It handles large artwork, bold color and broad coverage across the chest or back, and it is the sensible choice when a design is big, flat and going onto a lot of tee shirts.
A single order often uses both: embroidered polos for the people at the counter, screen printed tees for a crew or an event. If you want the longer comparison, the benefits of embroidery and silkscreen printing goes into more depth. Send the artwork and the garment you have in mind and we will tell you which method the job actually wants.
If the mark itself needs work before it goes onto a garment, our logo design and development service handles that first, so the file is built to be stitched and printed rather than adapted at the last minute.
What Houston Industries Tend to Order
Houston’s business mix shapes what comes through the door, and the pattern across the city and the wider Texas Gulf Coast area is fairly consistent:
- Industrial and energy operations: hard-wearing work shirts and caps, usually ordered alongside safety awareness signage and site materials rather than on their own.
- Construction and the trades: crew shirts and hi-vis apparel, plus jobsite banners and decals.
- Labor unions and locals: member apparel, event merchandise and meeting materials, produced union.
- Professional services and healthcare: embroidered polos and outerwear, client gift sets, and conference giveaways.
- Restaurants, retail and nonprofits: staff apparel and event merchandise, often on shorter runs and tighter budgets.
Two other posts are worth a look if you are still deciding what to order: the types of promotional products most commonly used in marketing, and promotional items for corporate gift bags.
Branded Merchandise and Custom Promotional Products We Produce Most
The catalog above runs to hundreds of options. In our Canal St. shop, though, most orders from Houston, TX companies come back to a short list of pieces that get used every day and keep a logo in sight:
- Custom apparel: embroidered polos, caps and jackets, and screen printed tee shirts and sweatshirts for staff, crews, volunteers and events.
- Drinkware: mugs, cups, tumblers and water bottles with your logo, among the longest lasting promotional items an office or crew will use.
- Tote bags and backpacks: trade show and conference bags that carry everything else you hand out.
- Pens, notepads and desk items: low cost, high quantity giveaways for front desks, mailers and events.
- Trade show displays and printed pieces: banners, table covers and signs for the booth, plus business cards, flyers and brochures to go with the giveaways.
- Personalized gifts and awards: engraved awards, executive gifts and personalized gift sets for clients and employees.
Tell us the event, the audience and the budget, and we will suggest the promotional products that fit. Every order is quoted up front, and the order minimums and turnaround for apparel are listed on our FAQ page.
How Custom Apparel and Embroidery Orders Work
- Choose the garment and the method: send the garment, the quantity and your logo. We will recommend embroidery or screen printing based on the fabric and the artwork. We do not decorate spandex or stretch fabrics.
- Artwork and digitizing: for embroidery, your logo is scanned and digitally plotted into a stitch file that is kept on hand for reorders. Designs can use up to eight thread colors. For screen printing, we print simple one or two color logos as well as full color designs. Our artists on staff can turn an idea or a sketch into finished art.
- Proof and approval: you approve the layout, colors and placement before production starts.
- Production and pickup: the order is decorated and finished, then picked up at our shop at 2907 Canal St. or shipped if you are outside Houston.
Union Made and American Made Apparel
Labor organizations, campaigns and union contractors often need apparel that is made by union labor, not only decorated in a union shop. We have relationships with a select group of American and Union made apparel suppliers, so member shirts, caps and jackets can meet that requirement from the garment up. Pair them with union printing for meeting materials and mailers so the whole order carries the same standard.
Promotional Products FAQs
Embroidery stitches the design into the fabric, which suits polos, caps, jackets and bags and survives heavy laundering. Screen printing lays ink onto the surface, which suits large, bold artwork across tee shirts and event apparel. The garment and the artwork usually decide it, not preference.
Yes. We work across Greater Houston and the Gulf Coast for everyday apparel, print and signage, and we ship nationwide for union printing, direct mail and safety programs. Local customers are welcome to come to 2907 Canal St. to look at samples in person.
Send what you have and we will tell you whether it will hold up. Embroidery and screen printing both want clean, properly built artwork, and a small web image often will not stitch or print well at size. If the file needs rebuilding, our logo design and development service can handle it before production starts.
Yes, and it is usually the better way to buy. Apparel, commercial printing and banners and signs all run through the same shop, so the color and the branding stay consistent across the whole set and you are dealing with one supplier.
Yes. Carroll Printing & Promotions is the Gulf Coast’s oldest Union printing company and has been in business since 1921. That matters to labor organizations, political campaigns and any buyer with a union sourcing requirement. See union and political printing for that side of the business.
Yes. We have relationships with a select group of American and Union made apparel suppliers for members, campaigns and union contractors who need it.
Embroidery designs can use up to eight thread colors. With screen printing, we can print a simple one or two color logo or a full color design. Order minimums are listed on our FAQ page.
Get a quote on apparel and promotional products
Embroidery, screen printing and promotional products for Houston businesses, unions and events. Send the garment, the quantity and the number of colors and we will come back to you with pricing and a schedule.
Or call 713-228-9331. Have a question first? See our apparel and embroidery FAQs.